god

Flannel Graph Jesus

/ Norman Eric Peterson / 1 Comment

We are made in his image. We breath in every breath Twenty five Sextillion molecules which get fed into sixty thousand miles of veins, arteries and capillaries. And the 1+1+1 = 1 made it all within us. As far as we can see into the universe. It is now seen as at least 93 billion light Years long or wide, whatever you want to try and imagine as impossible to comprehend.

God spoke it to existence by the way. How big or small is the Lord of creation?

I read a lot and some things stick a bit longer in me such as I have mentioned, meditating on simple things such as “who are you Lord and who am I praying to?” 1. I have also read about a church that Frederic Buechner searched for. He visited them all nearby. Lutheran, Methodist, Catholic, Presbyterian, New age, Old age and all the rest. He finally settled on one called Smokey Mary’s.

It was a large cathedral type with constant incense burning and smelled like Christmas. At the stage or platform as it is called, were the leaders and priests/clergy dressed in elaborate ways that seemed as the Micado was in production. There was chanting in Latin or perhaps Russian. It seems to me Frederic was seeking Holiness, mystery and something incomprehensible to him. It worked and the mystery was there. I would like to visit there too. “Never loose a Holy curiosity” 2.

No flannel graph Bibles to be seen. Otherworldly approaches to everything of religion and faith in an incomprehensible worship of the God of creation. A good start. There was no preaching with words that we have grown used to and even doze a bit thinking about Sunday dinner. Sin, Transfiguration, repentance and such. We just breeze by listening sometimes and once again, try to imagine what God meant when he stated we were made in their image.

I wear flannel shirts sometimes. I could be stuck to a graph in two dimensional purgatory for all I know. I heard His voice once, saved my life but I did not see Him or a burning bush either. I know I have been blessed beyond my comprehension many times and the only answer to that is my purpose is to tell everyone I can about the love of God.

What does He look like we all wonder. I stood and stared at the ceiling of the Sistine chapel and the finger of God reaching towards Adam. It worked as an image for a while. The best that Michelangelo could come up with. Anthropomorphic, to keep us all a little calmer when thinking of a million galaxies and it’s creation. By one word. A planet in the unfashionable spiral arm of the Milky Way. Orbiting a yellow dwarf star at 161,000 miles per hour. Every second our star burns 4 million tons of matter into fusion energy (E=MC2) Oh yes, we spin at 1,000 mph. What a creation. Just for us, perfect except for the north and south poles. Hard to live there.

1. Frederic Beuchner Also with many thanks to Henri Nouwen, Mark Batterson, and Tycho Brahe

2. Albert Einstein

It’s pretty good. Norman Peterson / Jack Gator

Working in the Cold

/ Norman Eric Peterson / Leave a comment

Up here in the north, working outside without gloves, can be unpleasant. Not often, but it also can lead to frostbite. A handful of times, I had to work on cars and trucks outside our shop in the winter because the shop was already full of work. Emergency operations. Misfires, leaks and such leading to inability to get to work or school. Not much fun to replace sensors or wiring when it is below zero.

After the work was done, blowing on my cupped hands helped a little while I got back into the warm shop. I began thinking about why I got angry about such things. Why my spirit was feeling low. I was cold in my mind and not very kind in thought, even about myself. I recently have been training my immediate language responses to distressing situations. Using Latin and Greek.

Styx and Hades for example. Chronos. And others. I am making some progress. You know the drill. Easy to resort to old habits that are unpleasant to hear. Get away from me Athena and Eros.

Having something going immediately into me that would calm my mind and spirit. Calm, almost humorous come forth. Pleasing and disabling anger completely. A wind warming my spirit, blowing through. Pleasantly and completely felt. The new song and breath of God, as He cups me in His hands that I welcome with relief and joy. It worked! I did not curse you Lord, I dismissed the anger by just using the useless names of shelf gods that do not care if they are praised or cursed. Just words of humor really.

I am not saying anger is humorous but relief from it quickly is. Memory can be very useful and assisted by the third person of the Holy Trinity, is downright pleasant. I always wondered why Jesus prayed to the Father. Jesus the begotten Son who was with God and is God (at the start of time as John, the one Jesus Loved wrote). Who is God and who do I pray to when I pray? 1.

Good thoughts from an Abbot of Genesee to meditate on. How do I pray and how do they answer me? The holy spirit is the voice and guide in me. Welcome Him in and you get all three of them on an eternal party line. Meditate on that if you and I will and the advice from that wise Monk that tells me if I get confused about this, “just read Newsweek to relax”

It works. Just listen or read the latest news about riots, dissent and violence and then get back to chatting with the Lord (what do I mean when I say ‘Lord’?) and get that breath and wind that calms and warms our heart and spirit. Amazed once again by His gift of joy. “May He turn His face towards you and give you peace”. Shalom Shalom.

Norman Peterson / Jack Gator

  1. Henri Knouwen

A Dance and a Kiss

/ Norman Eric Peterson / Leave a comment

It was a real scorcher of an August day. The usual formula, 80 to 90 with humidity to match. The heat index was high and I always wanted to learn the calculations but plowed my calculus exam at the institute of technology. It was sweaty and work of that sort was on the menu.

Not the garden today, the weeds on the south side of the big automotive shop I ran for almost 5 decades. Metal siding and roof and a big commercial sign over one of the bay doors.

Everyone knew what needed to be done and everyone but me was already working today. Volunteer locust trees, accompanied by the usual weeds. Gravel on a slope all around and some of the small trees very close to the greenhouse and the cement foundation for the old pump house.

I began to work and the locust bushes (some over 7 feet tall) doing their best to turn into trees were on the A list. Main trunks well over an inch thick needed the long handled lopper. Thick gloves, good jeans with only one diagonal slash from a small chainsaw accident and excellent boots. It was hot and short sleeves prevented overheating. Then I had to put on a thick canvas jacket at the time of picking up the trimmings. It started to get a little hotter.

Several small puncture wounds and the forty foot row of trap rocks against the building was once again visible. The blood had dried on my left arm. It was getting pretty sweaty after pilling up the branches, weeds and such. Time for a break. I was amazed at how wet I was with sweat.

I found the small clippers that I had covered up with weed debris, grabbed everything else including my thermos of ice water. I walked down the three steps from the shop, turned left off the new sidewalk and went over to cool off under the shade of our gigantic Chinese elm. I sat on my birthday gift wooden swing and settled in with my water jug horizontally stabilized on the slats of the swing. There was a delightful breeze and the view is always pleasant. The white lap sided farmhouse with six gables and a treasure of small trees and plants set in the trap rock around the perimeter.

A swallow tail butterfly was fluttering near the pots of zinnias by the shop and it caught my attention. I asked to see a butterfly dance with an imagination and a wish. The butterfly soon came over the top of the zinnia bush flowers and it began its dance. Just over the grass on the other side of the walk. Back and forth, up to the top of the lilac bush by the house corner. Then gliding back down to the grass up to the zinnias. Dancing in the sunlight. Back and forth several times and then went out to the driveway and sat down. “How was that?” It seemed to say.

Why not ask it to come over and give me another dance and then a kiss? I closed my eyes and there coming close to me was the butterflies creator. Smiling with an embrace and a brothers kiss of greeting. He looked like I imagine Him to look. His description is found in Isaiah 53 by the way. If you are with a friend, the confrontations and weariness of your world are soothed over and sometimes, are forgotten completely. There is great comfort in intimacy with another’s spirit and the love of Christ shared between each other. Starting sometimes with a drawn fish in the sand. New and old. Transformation takes place again and smiles in our heart began to show.

Meanwhile, Julie was concerned as she hadn’t seen me in hours and was in contact with Jesus asking Him if I was OK. Quickly she was assured that I was ‘with Him!’ Her first thought was she would find me lying in the sun smiling and gone. At the exact time I was still entranced with the kiss of brotherly love and satisfied to the whole of me. I was indeed, with Him. “I could go right now” Not my first choice I thought but about as good as it gets nonetheless. A perfect ending to a love affair that grows stronger every day. I too knew I would have a smile if I was lying there.

I finally grabbed my ice to water thermos and left the swing and swallow tail and went in the back door to the kitchen. Julie was processing sweet potatoes for the drying racks and we shared this kismet of the butterfly and Jesus’ gift of faith with one another. Astonished by Him stopping by and then our shared joy. It was now toward the end of the afternoon. Julie was reassured as to what was meant by ‘I was with Him’. Not my time yet to “go rest high on that mountain.”

Julie mentioned that a few days ago she had been asking our Lord if she was hearing Him correctly that He would answer her earnest prayers. He told her to go to the raspberry bushes and pick four of them. Late August and the berry season is over. She found them and as in her usual way, wanted to share them with me. “They are just for you was warmly said by the Lord”. Very sugary and brilliant red. Four of them, all that was there. She shares a lot of things.

As I write now, I can see from my desk our flag waving on the long pole just to my left. The garden and the gladiolas and the heavy laden bean poles are also visible through the front door windows. I am still stunned. Indeed, I have a smile. Limitless delight and faith abounds once again. My work clothes are stuck to me and my shirt is hard to remove. A light supper awaits.

My mentor that I delight in wrote this about prayer: “And why should the good of anyone depend on the prayer of another? I can only answer with the return question, “Why should my love be powerless to help another?” George MacDonald

Jack Gator With thanks to Henri Nouwen on the Lectio Devinia on Mount Tabor and Vince Gill for the song

It Swirls Like Smoke on the Ridge

/ Norman Eric Peterson / Leave a comment

A sunny morning in winter found me reading in our living room in my favorite chair. An excellent book by Frederick Buechner. His story inspires mine. I was also glancing up and watching fine, powder snow swirl in strong wind just beyond the window on my left.

It was blowing off the barn edges and up on the high hill, obscuring the 40 foot tall pine rows. It was swirling about in a Brownian movement. Circling about itself and appearing as smoke that is mostly seen as driven snow, sleething across a highway

Reading on in Frederick’s book , Listening to your life. I began following the intimate thoughts and loss of dear friends that shared poetry of life with me. An unusual chord progression or high harmonic would engender conversation, long after the shared concerto we were playing, just the two or three of us in a room. Swirling about in delight for us all. Never repeated or written down.

I miss those friends and their instruments that opened from the cases with the snap of clasps. Tuning just a bit with their 12 strings that needed constant attention. My six was in tune before theirs were. We would then start playing, slowly until the tune would catch up with us and akin to the smoky snow swirls, would indeed spin around, settle in a new mound of notes and harmonies never before heard.

As I continued reading I began to see my desire for that engaging and impromptu beauty with dear departed ones. We sat many hours and years together, also impromptu, delightfully just in time for another go at it. We were separated later in life by long lines on a map and later by eternity itself. They are together, waiting for me to join the beauty of music. King David would perhaps join in the jam session on his harp with Asaph with his beauty with words.

A vision brought to me by the gift of a perfect small snow blizzard as I sat near the parlor stove. Looking out our big windows. I could feel that beauty. Never to be repeated as every snow flake is different in uncountable numbers.

I see that hunger for communication now with others, often as old as I am. We wander about in the large parking lots and buildings or even on the opposite sides of gas pumps. There is a sign from each of us as shared events and life experiences that only are remembered by our generations. Duck and cover, the draft and several puzzling wars we all were in. I see them proudly wearing their ball caps usually with Vietnam Veteran on them. A glance and a brief nod of my head is enough for both of us. Adrift and swirling around our world and just needing that high E string tweaked. Harmony and those 12th fret harmonics signaling unity in tune with one another. I miss those friends and I know you still miss someone when all of the love was there.

It’s pretty good. Norman Peterson / Jack Gator

It’s so easy when you’re an Adult (1)

/ Norman Eric Peterson / Leave a comment

Everyone, I mean everyone had to learn the basics when we were children. It’s obvious even to me. 81 trips around the sun now. Riding a bicycle for example. Did anyone climb on to a 10 speed racing bike and right away began strongly climbing hills with it? Of course not. So how did we get to that point of an understanding and skill to pull it off (starting with a smaller bike with training wheels of course) There had to be a teacher, an adult with knowledge and strength coaching, encouraging and helping us do so.

Another example: Writing and understanding language that is written. No one, not even Einstein, could do so right out of the gate of childhood. First huge flash cards perhaps, gentle words and skill as a teacher-parent to help. The the writing part (Gators handwriting could use some improvement) but as sloppy and ill formed the letters are, imitating the adults writing words to teach. Maybe even holding the child’s hand to help. It works, it’s the way things are done for every child ever born, even you.

As adults, we still need this training. Some call it school or primary, secondary, college an upward learning which still needs an adult with skill and love to ‘hold our hand’ to continue learning. As an example: I play stringed instruments, my son plays a percussion instrument. A side note; the piano is considered a percussion instrument! How did I and they learn how to do this? Another Adult who knows these things.

In my case, even bowing the violin while fingering the notes. Such off key and bumbled sounds caused myself to wince but so did my learning bicycle riding. At least I did not fall off the violin. ‘So easy when you know how’, is said. These are simple thoughts that I am just reminding you of reality, perhaps so obvious, we do not even have it cross our minds. Even potty training. Teaching is a skill not all of us have but potty training is a skill that all parents realize they must do. It’s one of the first classes along with eating spinach.

When we are all grown up adults (except some adults who never grow up), there is a class which I will call finding purpose and the reason we are alive to have one. It’s the big question which, amazingly is put on our ‘back book shelves’ until the inevitable urge to press in and get answers comes.

Many people do not want a complex answer, or one that looks to an older adult that has some answers. Often we ignore them as foolish and misled in their ‘professed wisdom along with other adults. Or their class on a ‘Higher Power’ which is a very beginning of purpose behind door 101. In the beginning class.

There even is a book which starts with those very words! Here is the the name of that book which many dismiss as ludicrous. The Bible. As I have stated in a previous column, It is a book that is written by and for adults and if you don’t want to read it, please don’t dismiss or talk trash about it. Read and understand it’s answer. The answer could be 42 1. That is the number of generations from Adam to Jesus.

There are also many other books which address the reason we are here and what to do about it and I have read many of them. A lot of them say we are here because of a random event that occurred long ago and we are also a result of randomness. These are not books made by and for adults to read. They are a child’s stories that are fun to read. Like most really intriguing fiction that engages our imagination. Many of them tell us there is no purpose to life except to enjoy it and die wealthy. How comforting and absurd.

The Bible tells us the God of all, created us just to give us the choice of loving Him or not. Love cannot exist without us choosing to love. We question the Bible, some dismiss it, some read and understand it. Akin to a Parent that shows us why we are here, and how we got here. God is that Parent and we are His children. At first reading it can be challenging. That’s the best part! You will read it over again. You can start anywhere in it. This book tells us the real meaning of life and why we are living. An old book, written by many authors, and they all have the same subject and the same Hero. It’s pretty good. (To be continued ) Norm Peterson / Jack Gator

1. deep thought computer from Douglas Adams hitchhikers guide to the galaxy.

Rome, Are We any Different from Them?

/ Norman Eric Peterson / Leave a comment

My first thoughts on the very beginning was what a powerful nation Rome was. And yet, from poor leadership and inflated senses of self, she fell.

The philosophic, the scientific and the religious thoughts of today seem to be universal and timeless. My favorite is a slight variation from Descartes: “I think, therefore I am an intellectual” Or perhaps a young student who knows no history and runs on temporary feelings and some fools advice.

The mindset, the world outlook all colored by experiences is obvious, but still profound. Since I have read Francis Schaeffer’s book ‘How should we then live? several times, the concept of compromise and personal satisfaction runs through the whole book. Or; “how ya doin’? Fine, thanks! How’re you doin? Fine, thanks for asking” ad infinitum.The god’s we are now embracing instead of Jesus, seem to be somewhat familiar to Romes. Universal reset to the golden calf that ‘just appeared’ out of the fire of, the struggles of life. My generations gods: Sex, drugs and Rock and Roll. A little commune life spiced up with all those things.

Communist Hippies. Precursors to the Woke generation. I am special (true!) You are not (false) All truth is false and that’s the truth! “Eat the rich”, People power, Rent Strike! Make enough money for a pitcher of beer across Cedar Avenue, West bank of Minneapolis which now is totally Somali immigrants feeding money back home from fooling the dole que. I lived there after discharge and it was headquarters of world class musicians and hippies. They don’t speak English there now and they hate America except for our money. I don’t judge them for their race, just their ties to people who hate Israel and us. Thanks president Biden for flying them in on Walz’ sanctuary city scam.

The Roman Empire. Similar to ours in many ways. Conqueror of the known world. Roads everywhere. Most powerful country, best military, Controlled civilization with Caesar in absolute control to keep the roaming gangs in line.

The battle of Christian believers in the first 300 years were pretty bad and then just after Constantine made the state religion Baptist, the whole thing went sour with apathy and slouchy living. Violence, weird and badly done artwork, fascination with sex and of course, the games and government stimulus checks. Followed by inflation. Sound familiar?

Just like us. Then the whole thing fell apart and Rome was not the big guy in the world. Their freeways and secondary roads are somewhat still in use! Just a little narrow and bumpy and the bridges are iffy.

It seems that Greek civilization was not the main model we have used today for government and structure of society. It’s Rome. Not too long ago, our nation rejected our Creator and his Son for no god at all, Hegel, Darwin, Marx and Brilliant Steven Hawking. The god of our own power and science. Pretty flimsy religion.

Oh the Methodists, Baptists, Lutherans and Catholics putter along in competition with one another for the ‘Truth’ and the most perfect worship and doctrine. Good musicianship helps the popularity chart as well.

A Henri Nouwen quote seems appropriate here. ” When I pray, to whom do I pray? When I say Lord, what do I mean? This is the real question, the only question that you can make your most important question…when the question exhausts you so much that you need to read Newsweek for a little relaxation!” 1.

Apathy again. We care about the state of our country and talk about it a lot! As long as we have our goodies, lake homes and boats, recliners and bigger TV screens than our friends, we are on top. Until we get older and weird looking and forget who we are and who we are in God. As if we knew about God in our “used tea bag minds“.2.

We must be very careful to not be as sarcastic as I usually am. There is something wrong with our country, our world and Francis Capon says it well. ‘How should we then live?’2. Jesus Jesus Jesus, nothing else will do. Then It’s pretty good. Norman Peterson / Jack Gator

1. Henri Nouwen

2 .Frederic Capon

Musicians of Eternal Sound and Sight

/ Norman Eric Peterson / Leave a comment

There I was, Camera 2 on a tripod mounted at Front of House. Instructed over my head com to push in with the lens and get a closer view of the electric guitar on the left side of the platform.

What a sound! The number 4 camera got a really nice shot and the director kept that shot on the side screens and lobby screens for a LONG time as Troy played the song. ..” I see creatures all around you, thunders and lightnings” of the Revelation song. It was loud, wicked and over the top” You could see troy with his famous grin, enjoying the worship with a heart filled with adoration. He was having too much fun.

The steam powered Bigsby bar sound coupled with a metal finger slide brought the house down and suddenly, there was a loud scream from the front of the room: “I’ve been washed!”

She was dancing and leaping about and kept her hand over her heart and security just stood there amazed, stunned and reassured that the Holy Spirit was in full force in the room and in them. A thousand people or more just filled with Joy they never experienced nor expected.

We got it all and the simulcast went all over the world. Things began to happen in England, Poland, Australia and other places too fast to type down off the internet feed. It was glorious. The room began a conga line up and down the aisles, laughing and enjoying the joy that spread throughout…everywhere. “Holy, Holy is the Lord God almighty” was heard six times every second around the world. The speed of light is like that. Fast.

There was a sea of glass in all skies, blazing and the man with eyes of fire replaced the sun and moon and called us to join him in rapture. Forever. It was pretty good! Norm Peterson / Jack Gator

  • Many thanks to Mitch Teemley for capturing the picture of the guitar

String theory on the Intelligentsia Playground

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In order to prove the theory of gravitation which is linked with the resonance of particulars, a linear accelerator the size of a galaxy would be needed. That would take quite a government grant. Another quote: “..it all depends on exactly what you call gravity” or, “ will we ever know the real nature of space and time?”

We Have a swell free magazine operation. Early or late, 24 hours open is the library magazine drop off . (It is the place where I met the ‘North Dakota Drifter’) I stopped on my way to an early morning swim, stopped at the Wisconsin small town library heated atrium with a small bench and deposit slots for media and books. On the bench cardboard magazine contribution box I found several magazines of interest. One of them in particular that had an article speculating on the beginning of space and time. There is some disagreement among the research and the most popular version involves a fantastic theorem. Well researched and well written too.

Roughly the theory speculates that both space and time emerged from the structure and behavior of more basic components of nature. It is often referred to as “The theory of everything” This might be the analysis that the Monte Python movie was inspired by. Hyper pan dimensional mice are responsible for creation is that theory. Quite close to the article in Scientific American actually. Suddenly, in the midst of this complex article the “Big Bang” gets brought into the playground. OK, here is the summary in the article. String Theory: “It’s eponymous strings are the fundamental constituents of matter and energy, giving rise to myriad fundamental subatomic particles at particle accelerators around the world.”

That’s pretty basic stuff and it goes on from there. If you are a nuclear physicist, this is just the credits before the main attraction. Sort of like the disclaimer in action movies that state all names, places and people are fictional and bear no resemblance to real ones. Entertaining if you like to go to those sort of movies. And of course, we have to add Star Trek nomenclature into the thesis with black holes. Not the ones at the on ramp to highway 8. Those holes can take you where you have never gone before. Places like Jay Austins Auto sales and service.

Seriously, there is more with diagrams of resonance to particles galaxies away. Now they are getting somewhat closer. Science fiction such as “Out of the silent planet” or ‘Perelandra’ by C.S. Lewis are more entertaining with the precepts given in those books. Try ‘Life, the universe and everything’ by Douglas Adams. There is even a movie made out of that one. Hitchhikers guide to the Galaxy.

I am looking forward to that answer. Perhaps, as I speculated in one of my columns, ‘The watchmaker in Paradise’ (published October 27th 2021) We have no idea what we will encounter in a place indeed without time or perhaps the universe as we see or imagine it is. This thought ‘string’ is perhaps what all these brilliant physicists are searching for. Desperately searching for anything to explain how and why we are here, or what here is.

I know there is a mind that created me and you and all that we are and will be. After all, the brilliance of scientists ends at the endorsement of the theory of ‘The big bang’ a popular view that takes God out of the creation. Perhaps some scientist will actually believe that they can create life from elements of our earth or discover life in our own backyard of the solar system. The challenge to create life from dirt is you have to get your own dirt. Evolution does not compute at all. My eye could not possibly be built by waiting 5 billion years for eyes to ‘evolve’ As in the article of string theory it could be said, “Get your own string” The most basic thoughts from children is “If there was a big bang, where did it come from and who lit the fuse?”

Three words can describe our existence and they are written down in an incredible book. “In the beginning..” Is anything impossible to the eternal God that was not created that can spend an eternity with just you or me?

Eternity indeed is calling me away, calling me home and it’s pretty good.. Norman Peterson /Jack Gator

Discarded

/ Norman Eric Peterson / Leave a comment

I was in my twenties when I found an apartment that fitted my mood. Recently discharged from the military and I was going to art school! The apartment fit the inherited car from his Grandfather, an old, square shaped Buick sedan. It wasn’t like my first car, the British Racing Green MGA with the real knock-off spoke wheels and Pirelli Cinturados and a Derrington wood rim steering wheel. No, It was the car of my discarded Grandfather, now passed down to me. Discarded because the once strong fireman was not capable of driving or putting out fires anymore. It felt good to me to get that old Buick.

Grandpa had killed my cat when I was young, because it had to be as Grandpa could not have my cat in his home when Mom and her new husband went on their honeymoon to Sweden. I had no say as I was in grade school and felt discarded, set aside and not worthy of dialogue or even gentleness. Mom and her immigrant husband never went on that honeymoon either. One of those memories of the life of a person now dead but living within me. a.

It felt sort of similar too that my family sold my precious MGA when the draft came in with a whirlwind of death harvest for Vietnam. I signed up first before I could have gone west to the jungles. I went east to the Mediterranean sea instead.

So I sold Grandpas Buick right away, traded it for an Austin Healy Sprite. It felt good to be in a roadster again. Made up a bit for the Green MGA and the cat.

My apartment was a dump. Second floor above a Sherman Williams paint store on the wrong side of the tracks. Corner store, separate entrance. I had a neighbor who was down and out and bummed smokes from me. When I would ask him how things were going, the neighbor always said: “just take me to the dump” That memory reminds me of Marvin the paranoid android in Hitchhikers guide. “I’m not getting you down am I?”

It seems that the latest attitude we all have. “It’s at the end of it’s service life” or “that old thing? Too expensive to fix, toss it” “ You’re what! Pregnant! Git rid of it, You’ve got your whole life ahead of you!” and our favorite: “Heck, he’s over 80. Forget that cornea transplant. I mean really, how many years does he have left anyway?” “Put her in a home, she won’t notice anyway” And so forth. As side note, as I edit this post I just had eye surgery for cataracts and I am 81. Love it! I can drive without glasses now.

Feeling useless because the popular philosophy now is Existential in nature. One man in particular, a philosopher, Friedrich Nietzsche, went insane in the most beautiful country in the world, Switzerland. He came to the point of knowing the tension and despair for the loss of meaning in his life because of the loss of a personal God. His words are profound: “ But all pleasure seeks eternity-a deep and profound eternity”. Groucho Marks said: ” I want to live forever and I’ll die trying it” Truth from a great comedian.

Our country has found itself discarding our God of Creation perhaps because He is inconvenient and is sort of a kill joy because of all those rules he has. “I can’t follow all those rules in the Bible!” Of course we can’t, that’s the point of the rules. We need Him.

So we discard what we feel and know is not worthwhile to us. An old car, out of date food and personal relationships that are used up and don’t make us feel the way we want to. Or the way we feel we are entitled to perhaps. We have so much ‘stuff ‘ that it gets in our way when we don’t like it or need it. Broken things, old things past their expiration dates. Things that we don’t even remember acquiring. And so it goes on and on until it becomes easier to discard than repair. “That car, it was getting old and anyway, I was tired of driving it” How much different is it when it comes to this? “He was getting on my nerves. All this talk about going to a church marriage counselor! It was his fault, so I divorced him”

It seems prudent to us to just put it in a blue plastic container and park it down by the end of the driveway every Tuesday. ‘Don’t throw the baby out with the bath water! Throw out the tub too!’ I can do what I want, that’s what the world says. Another philosopher, De Sade put it well: “If there is no standard, no real moral base, then that old woman walking down the road can either be helped or run over. No difference if there are no moral standards” Those standards have been firmly set by an eternal infinite loving God who knows us and desires us to love him with the same passion he loves us.

So, it’s our choices, the small ones that make a great impact on everyone. Should I discard this friend? This inconvenient baby? This old fashioned religious teaching? This God who never did anything I asked Him to do?

Always, always our choice to build, repair, embrace and seek truth in the eyes of the Man who is more alive than any man who ever lived. Jesus, the master repairman of old and stressed lives. It’s pretty good.

Norm Peterson / Jack Gator For continuation of this story line see ‘Motorcycle Pilgrimage 1-5

a. Mark Batterson “please, thanks and sorry”

Synopsis of a Fool on the road to Redemption

/ Norman Eric Peterson / Leave a comment

A recall of my life is now being revealed to me, bit by bit. Indeed all the mistakes, roads taken that had no outlet or were literally dead ends, were there to take me to a place I did not know I was going. This is the reason I was given the opportunity to write this book. I thought it was my idea!

The Author whose books anchor a sagging bookshelf in our library, has given me hope and excitement as he has done for so many. C.S. Lewis. The first name Jessie Seline and I decided on for my Fiddling Gator identity was Jack. {It was Clive Staples Lewis’ nickname.}

So many authors have that first name in fiction writing and Jessie and I decided it was perfect. Punchy like Jack Dempsey. Masculine and only four letters long. It stuck after being known as ‘Mr Gator’ for years. That story comes to light in this book. A simple newspaper article about my role as a judge in a fiddle contest with a cartoon of an alligator, rocking back on his tail. playing the fiddle.

I know, without any doubt, that our Lord Jesus has me on speed dial to my spirit. I did not even know I had a phone like that before others before that have those, taught me how to listen. I listened when I was a big fool and now I am a tool. Those two letters are close on keyboards and are pushed with the left forefinger. Pointing the way to Him.

My counselor, Mr. Beeves, told me he had never met a man with more trauma than I. He also told me it would always be in my mind and would have six tenths of a second to turn off the reaction of fight or flight to perceived new trauma. Recently, I have asked Jesus to have a USB port put into my head and a jump drive with a program to dive deep and encase those memories where they belong. The past. He has recently acquiesced to that request! Very recently. I did not know He could do that or that I could ask. Look for the port if we meet and I will split hairs with you and show it to you.

Go, Set and get ready. Go to Him set your heart before Him and with Him, and you are ready. Stay on that Highway to Holiness, for “the road to hell is an easy slope, soft underfoot with no warning signs” a. I have asked many friends that were near death to meet me as I ‘cross the bar’ to eternity. I saw one of them leave with five words as he disappeared: “It’s better than you said!” It is.

a. C.S. Lewis